Category Archives: Writing For Purpose 1 (John)

The digital article I wrote concentrates on the burglaries of e-cigarettes and PC equipment in Hornsea. It is aimed at a local audience and would suit a publication such as ‘The Hull Daily Mail’ as it specializes in local human interest stories. ‘The Bridlington Free Press’ would also be good choice as it often publishes articles on Hornsea and there have been a similar spate of burglaries in both Bridlington and Driffield.

I came across the story of the break in via a friend, her son is the owner of the shop. I went along to talk to Robert his employee. In doing so I also uncovered another story about a series of break-ins in Hornsea. Robert informed me of the businesses that had been targeted. I visited each one and managed to obtain recorded interviews from 2 of them. I also took photos to accompany the story.

The target audience is young people as they have more interest in everything that is digital. Probably, more male orientated because of the subject matter (although statistically the consumption of e-cigarettes in the UK is higher in women) It is for this reason that I have kept the text minimal and included inter-active media. Far more viewers are likely to consume media on the go so it is important to add visuals, such as video clips that can be accessed via mobile phone. I have included an inter-active map to make the story more credible and interesting.

Witless thief attempts to sell stolen goods on Facebook

However, further intervention from the police was not needed. The thieves were caught, through their own stupidity, by trying to sell the e-vapes on Facebook.

Robert Bemrose, employee at East Coast Vapes, explained what happened.

The e-liquids were easy to identify as they came from a specialist supplier in Bradford and were a distinctive brand.

Karl Sheard, the proprietor, found the stolen goods advertised on a popular Hull vaping group page on Facebook. He managed to recover some of the goods although expensive e-starter kits had been sold on. He said he did not wish to press charges.

The robbery was not connected to a spate of recent burglaries in Hornsea.

On the evening of the 22nd November, 2016 several shops in the town centre were the target of burglaries and attempted break-ins. Karl’s PC Repairs, in Newbegin, Hornsea was the hardest hit. Thieves forced the door, stole hundreds of pounds worth of computer supplies and trashed the shop.

The culprits have been identified and apprehended by the police. However, the cost of repairs to the shop have been substantial. Customer’s mobile phones and laptops, in the shop for repair, have not been recuperated.

Storify is a social media tool that lets you create stories from a variety of social media resources like Facebook and Twitter, as well as other web resources. You can use it to pull together information on whatever you want, and can customise it how you want, then share your story on the site with your friends on those social media sites.

It is easy to use, just create a new story and add content by copying and pasting links from social media and then writing your own content. After publishing the article it can be embedded into your posts. Unfortunately, with the free version of WordPress you can only insert as a link. I have added the link below as an illustration of how to add content from Twitter.

Infogram

With Infogram you can chose from hundreds of maps and charts to create interactive diagrams to suit your project. This is particularly useful if you have a lot of data, which tends to become tedious when written out. It is also a great way of visualising comparisons.

In order to create the graph below I used statistics that I found on Box Office Mojo, a movie website for box office news and analysis. I used Microsoft Excel to organise the data.

Piktochart

Piktochart is a simpler tool for creating easy infographics. It is suitable for users with limited ability but is less responsive than Infogram.

“Piktochart is a web-based infographic application which allows users without intensive experience as graphic designers to easily create professional-grade infographics using themed templates.”

Audioboom is a voice recording app useful for interviews, reporting, storytelling or just keeping a record.

It is quick and easy to install and use on your phone. It enables you to record for up to 10 minutes and then edit and save your recordings. What’s more it is absolutely free.

Before recording it is important to establish where the microphone is on your phone and place this as near to the speaker as possible. Also be aware of any potential background noise. The sound waves illustrate the strength of the volume on the recording.

When finished upload it via publish. You can crop and edit your recording. Personalise the recording by adding a photo and embed an audioboom post on your website/blog.

Preparing images for use on websites/blogs

Points to remember before uploading an image:

Name-make sure the name fits the image so you can find it easily.

Size-Large images take a lot longer to load. Scale the image down if possible without ruining the quality. Can use pic-resize or JPEGMini. After uploading you can use YSlow to tell if image had been successfully optimized.

Caption-add a caption if it provides useful information or would enhance image SEO.

Alt text can be added to an image so there will be a descriptive text if the image isn’t displayed to the visitor. Include SEO keyword relating to image.

LEEDS CITY CENTRE REVAMP TO ACCOMODATE HS2

The preferred route of the second phase of the national high-speed rail project was released today by the Department for Transport and HS2 Ltd, showing how the new line will come into Leeds. The announcement also confirms the revised plans released last year for Leeds Station to be remodelled into an integrated ‘Yorkshire Hub’ to accommodate HS2 alongside regional and local services.

The original proposed route of HS2, which would see passengers travel from Leeds to London in 81 minutes, had raised concerns in terms of the impact of certain areas of the city. However, Council leaders are confident the £1bn-plus programme will strengthen the links between Northern powerhouse cities including Manchester and York.

“HS2 will be the largest single investment in transport ever in north of England and it will deliver a transformational change to growth and jobs in West Yorkshire and the Leeds City Region economy.”

In Leeds, the busiest station, passenger numbers will double over the next 30 years.The redevelopment of the station is expected to provide approximately 13,000 new jobs. The regeneration of the South Bank will deliver a further 35,000 jobs and 4,000 homes.

Creating an Interactive Timeline using HSTRY

I created a beautiful timeline on ‘The History of Snowboarding’, using my Google log-in to create an account. Then realised when trying to publish that I had opened a student account which means that you have to be part of an educational group and join a class. Looks like I’ll have to start again. Learning by trial and error is proving to be a time consuming process.

Here’s a mini version of the original timeline just to show how easy it is to create and share on your own blog post:

It is a useful too as you can incorporate a lot of information over a long period of time. The google spreadsheet is already provided when you are logged into your account. This makes it easy to create, adapt and personalise your timeline.

During the lesson I created this short timeline to illustrate my day at college.